Some Photographs Illustrating House Sparrow Habitat Destruction (part 2).

This is the row of Apartments that have been built where the houses were. There is a large car park at the rear. The building is much closer to the site's boundaries than the original houses. These developments are going up in so many areas now, the houses left between them are coming under pressure from developers, while the house sparrows in the few remaining homes with suitable habitat are 'trapped' reluctant and unable to move to other locations. Where do they start looking if there is no continuation of suitable habitat in any direction?

These houses further along the road are due for demolition as the developers offer them a financial offer they find hard to refuse. If your street is being dominated by these imposing new apartment blocks, and you face increase traffic and reduced local wildlife, what incentive is there to stay and fight this destructive 'progress'. I feel very sorry for the house sparrow colony that remains in these houses. They will soon be gone.

My father lived in this house in Finchley from 1965 to 1999, and in all that time there were house sparrows living in and around it. I know, I used to live there and latterly visited my dad weekly. The house sparrows had several nests in the roof and used the surrounding privet hedges all the time. (My dad moved to Chingford where he has hedges and house sparrows.)

Whether the nest sites are still in the roof I don't know, but every time I've passed this house these past few months since the front garden was unceremoniously ripped out, there has been no sight of or sounds of House sparrows. My dad's old house was the last in the road for some distance to still have them - and the original front garden, and now there are no sparrows evident. It really saddened me when I realised they were gone forever. Most of the neighbour's front gardens were paved over years ago.

Although I don't have house sparrows living near my present flat, (there are no suitable hedges and the roof is well maintained) a few hundred metres away is a pathway where the sparrows not only live in the eaves of the adjacent houses (that have front gardens with hedges) but the thick privet, cotoneaster and ivy help support a thriving colony. They flit from hedge to hedge and squabble and chirrup deep within. This area has cats, magpies, and the occasional flyby of sparrowhawks. Of course the house sparrows remain, the habitat here is the same as it has been for years - at least the past 40 that I remember!

This is a view of some houses in Burnt Oak, London. This whole area was social council housing - built in the 1930's & 40's - until the 'Right to Buy' policy of the Conservative government in the 1980's gave tenants the right to buy. This area was rich in House Sparrows, and every house had a front garden boarded by privet hedges. Since people have been allowed to purchase houses, front gardens were paved over at an alarming rate, primarily for owners to park their cars on. Thankfully the district is now a conservation area, but sadly hedges and gardens are still disappearing. House sparrow colonies are fewer than I remember years ago, but in areas were the gardens and hedges remain, there are still very healthy sparrow and starling populations.

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